At that apparent age, all of us kids knew full well the difference between cap pistols, Daisy Red Ryders and Benjamin pumps, and "real" guns such as our .22 rifles. Parents and teachers, as well, knew that we knew...

konfederate.kowboy

July 3, 2010, 01:57 PM

i believe that an ad like that today would land any gun manf. in court. but i think art iss right in those days you did know the difference between toys and guns. i mean you didnt have a cap gun that was painted orange at the end either. but the world is coming to a differnt place if anyone else can be blamed they will be blamed.

and besides for $6 we know the ad must be a fake...

earlthegoat2

July 3, 2010, 02:00 PM

Ah the good days when everyone knew and respected guns.

Nowadays you have lawyers chomping at the bit to sue any manufacturer that does not have an internal lock or a huge warning rollmark on the side of the gun.

I think the most destructive thing our society is doing is actively preventing Darwinism from occuring and systematically weakening human existence.

FourteenMiles

July 3, 2010, 02:06 PM

I assume the girl is understood to know if you pull the trigger it is dangerous, otherwise it is safe.

It is basically saying if you don't pull the trigger it won't fire, although with an extreme (and silly) example.

yeti

July 3, 2010, 02:13 PM

I imagine they were thinking; this is a good way to illustrate that our $6 gun is reasonably safe even if your precocious little darling stumbles on it.

I don't believe they took into consideration, or really even cared, that 100 years later people would suffer a case of vapors seeing a line drawing of a child and a gun in the same bed. Except, maybe, for Bill McKinley, I don't think he was a fan.

It's kind of unfair to look at 19th Century advertising with a 21st Century mind set. It's a lot like looking at a 1960's automobile advertisement and being horrified because the children aren't strapped into child seats.

TNT in Round Rock

July 3, 2010, 02:45 PM

most of us (then) also knew that if mamma or daddy caught us messing with a gun we'd get our butt whupped !!!!

Deltaboy

July 3, 2010, 04:07 PM

The days when men were men and women were ladies and acted like it. In a Gun friendly society I learned to respect and use guns from birth own.

yeti

July 3, 2010, 04:11 PM

most of us (then) also knew...

Almost all of them (then{1905ish}) are no longer with us :((today). But congratulations on your outstanding longevity!:D

arizona_cards_11

July 3, 2010, 04:57 PM

Where can I get one for $6? :D

Runningman

July 3, 2010, 05:37 PM

"What were they thinking?" Considering the time frame.

The fact that the first American female superstar idolized by millions of people around the world was hunting at the age of six.

Add in the fact that this same female superstar believed strongly that it was crucial for women to learn how to use a gun to defend themselves. It might not be so unusual at all.

If you get a chance watch the PBS American Experience documentary on Annie Oakley. The ad might make more sense to people.

Zoogster

July 3, 2010, 05:54 PM

I think even in those times it was a bit of an exaggeration meant to get a little shock value, just not nearly as much as it does today.

This was at a time when many revolvers would discharge if dropped, or if the hammer was bumped, or pulled back slightly and allowed to fall on the round below without the person ever touching the trigger.
Just having the hammer snag on some clothing and then fall could discharge any round below it.

What this advertisement is saying is that even a child can handle this type of firearm without accidentally discharging it, only someone actually trying to shoot it by pulling the trigger will discharge it.

Today we take for granted that most firearms, especially handguns, will not fire unless the handler causes them to fire. But there was a time when just bumping some designs wrong, or handling them without the utmost care could discharge them, even if the trigger was never touched.

Leader

July 3, 2010, 06:43 PM

most of us (then) also knew that if mamma or daddy caught us messing with a gun we'd get our butt whupped !!!!
And there was no question that they would NOT go to jail for doing it.

JohnBT

July 3, 2010, 07:24 PM

It's a good ad. I guess that makes me old.

It's an ad full of good warnings. We need more good ads.

John

Old Fuff

July 3, 2010, 07:26 PM

Judging by the price, the advertisement dates from the late 1890's to about World War One (1917).

Smith & Wesson, Iver Johnson, Harrington & Richardson - as well as others - offered models that supposedly had safety devices built into the lockwork that would prevent a small child from firing them. Most of them had enclosed hammers, and the double-action trigger pull was too much for a small child to operate. The S&W Safety Hammerless also had a grip safety in addition to everything else.

Of course the advertisement wouldn't work today, especially in gun-dumb urban areas. Be that as it may, none of the handgun makers that I know of discontinued the sales pitch because too many children were shooting themselves or others.

Also in those days, when there was a problem parents were much more likely "to go to the seat of it." :uhoh:

Kentucky_Rifleman

July 3, 2010, 08:19 PM

I think the most destructive thing our society is doing is actively preventing Darwinism from occuring and systematically weakening human existence.

In Vietnam there was an ongoing operation called "Eldest Son" that seeded enemy ammo caches with cartridges Marines had reloaded by stuffing the cases with Bullseye Powder and then re-crimping the bullets.

I've often wondered that some enterprising soul who just lost a loved one to the gang war in L.A. hasn't taken up some similar practice.

Perhaps the Social Darwinists were behind the manufacturing of so many Saturday night specials that blew fingers off of hoodlums back in the 60s and 70s.

KR

hemiram

July 4, 2010, 04:26 AM

I had an Iver Johnson revolver, a .32, I think it was. At $6, it was still overpriced! What a mess it was. It was in amazing cosmetic shape, sat in a closet in the box for about 40 years before I bought it for 20 bucks in 1980 from a neighbor's widow. But it was barely functional. I cleaned it up, and lubed it up, etc, and it was still a mess. I put it on Gunbroker a couple years ago for $100, buy it now, and it was snapped up in a few minutes. I saw some others in about the same shape, and $100 seemed to be about right, but a lot of the others never got a bid, so I don't know what was so special about mine.

SMMAssociates

July 4, 2010, 06:19 AM

As Old Fuff mentioned, I had the opportunity to play with a bunch of "broken" (firing pins snapped off, mostly) guns when I was about eight or nine. A serious collector gave some of his junkers to an uncle of mine, for his kids. (This was in the early 50's....) I was surprised at not being able to operate them.... Nothing special, but too much for me....

They also sold revolvers and special dog loads in the late 1800's and early 1900's for folks who were being harassed by (wild) dogs while riding. Good luck on that today, too....

Still, it does all point back to "don't judge 'ancient views' with modern rules"....

Regards,

searcher451

July 6, 2010, 12:10 PM

The really sad thing here is that some of us, at least, are old enough to remember seeing ads just like when they first came out. :(

huntsman

July 6, 2010, 02:06 PM

Saw this on Fox News site. "What were they thinking?"

Makes me wonder how it the world did humans survive gun handling before the four rules were invented, and that whole finger out of the trigger guard thing also.

Why gun owners must have been Savages.

rmfnla

July 6, 2010, 02:21 PM

Read the ad more carefully.

In the lower right it says that this is a Safety Hammerless type of revolver as well (although they refer to it as an automatic, not uncommon for DA revolvers back then).

Safety Hammerless guns were (and still are) pretty difficult for young hands to operate since the grip safety required a decent amount of hand strength to disengage.

hammerklavier

July 6, 2010, 02:30 PM

Still it gives me the impression that "Papa said it can't hurt us" so he gave it to me to play with unsupervised.

loose cannon

July 6, 2010, 02:50 PM

back in the early 90s i handled a S&W safty hammerless.it took elbow grease for a adult to fire one of those.
brock lesener could hit with it,maybe,lol

NMGonzo

July 6, 2010, 03:02 PM

I want two ... $12 ... right?

SMMAssociates

July 6, 2010, 03:06 PM

By our standards, silly to the point of insanely dangerous, but they're advertising a gun that's designed to be extremely difficult to discharge, whether by the little one's fingers, or dropping, etc.

The PC folks and the Criminal and Terrorist Friendly would rend their panties over such an ad today, but the point is well made. You don't need a Hilary lock if the gun's designed to keep the kids from firing it.... AND, at the time, if there was a gun in the house, the Social Services people would assume that you were a bad parent only if you hadn't taught the kid to at least leave the thing alone.

You can't judge stuff like that (or Washington or Jefferson owning slaves, for that matter) by today's uber-Nanny-State standards....